A local digital video recorder may be used as the tuner to select and watch content on a television or as pass-through device that accepts content tuned using a client, such as a set-top box from a cable company or other source. Some digital video recorders automatically record the content stream being watched allowing pause live television functionality. “Live” in this context refers to the contemporaneous nature of the content stream, not the content of the stream (which may be pre-recorded). To have pause live television functionality at multiple televisions, each television must have a local digital video recorder connected between the source and the television. Often, the buffering that enables the pause live television feature introduces a delay of several seconds into the content stream. This can result in a disconcerting effect when two nearby televisions are tuned to the same channel, but only one has pause live television functionality because the content streams are out of sync.
More recently, some clients can communicate with a remote digital video recorder over the viewer's local area network. The networked digital video recorder is able to record content from any television without having a digital video recorder dedicated to each television. While some networked digital video recorders offer pause live television functionality, it is implemented on demand. When the viewer pauses the live television using their remote, the client communicates with the networked digital video recorder. At that point, the networked digital video recorder tunes into the channel being watched and starts recording. When the viewer resumes watching the program, the content stream is supplied from the networked digital video recorder service starting at the pause point rather than the live television content stream.
Communicating, switching channels, and starting to record the content is not an instantaneous process. The actual pause point is later than the point when the viewer pressed the pause button. As a result, when the program is resumed some content will be lost and cannot be revisited. It is not uncommon for a digital video recording service to have an actual pause point that occurs 15 seconds after the pause button is pressed. Such a long delay may be significant in the viewing experience. For example, if a viewer watching a baseball game presses pause right before a pitch, the actual pause point from where the content would resume might be from where the catcher is throwing the ball back to the pitcher. In other words, the long delay effectively causes the pitch to be missed. At the very least, this situation does not make for a positive viewer experience. It was with these problems in mind that the present invention was conceived.